Attack On Titan Review – The Bigger They Are The Harder They Fall

Attack on Titan is a game about taking on giant humanoid creatures that are trying to eat you. If you’ve seen the anime you already know this, if not is the game worth picking up and playing? Check out this Attack On Titan Review to help you make your choice!

Attack On Titan Review

Attack On Titan follows Eren Jaeger and his fellow cadets on their journey through the first season of the anime series. You will play multiple people from the 104th Cadet Corps such as Mikasa and Armin, as well as others. 100 years ago, mysterious creatures called Titans appeared and started attacking humans for no real reason. Titans are giant powerful Humanoids that range in size from double a Human to 10+ meters. After years of uneasy peace, the Titans broke down the Human’s wall and pushed them back further into their home. This attack put the Humans on their toes and now they are training to bring the fight back to the Titans and reclaim their lost land. This is where your journey starts, training to join the ranks of the elites and to defend your home from the Titans. The story has about 20 missions and will last you around 10ish hours depending on the difficulty you play on.

Outside of story mode you can also play Expedition mode. Expedition mode has you playing various missions on various maps so you can gain extra resources and materials for upgrades. You can upgrade your weapons, ODM gear(movement gear) and your scabbards to hold more gas and blades. Any resources, weapons or levels you gain here can be used in the story mode. You are also allowed to pick which character you want to use in expedition mode but the selection is very limited until you get deeper into the story mode. Expedition mode also has multiplayer with up to 4 players online. As much fun as it is taking on giant Titans alone, playing with 3 others and landing a synchronized strike on an opponent is a thing a beauty. We did run into some network issues while playing, with two disconnects in about 4 hours of play. To be fair, the game wasn’t officially out when this was tested so it might change when it launches.

Combat is the games bread and butter and it is done extremely well. I was worried with the ODM gear being such a needed thing in this game that it might not work well. For anyone unaware you can basically compare ODM gear to Spider-man’s webs but they are used to attach to Titans to strike their weak spots. It works almost perfectly and most importantly, it plays very well. You might feel a tad overwhelmed at first because of the speed and button combination is a bit weird, but seriously, after about 20 minutes it becomes second nature and you will be tackling Titans with the best of them. Now when you face a Titan you will have the choice of attacking the limbs or the nape of the neck, which is their weak spot and the only way you can kill them. Some limbs will have bonus materials on them or can be used to bring a Titan down to its knees. As you progress certain Titans will have higher defenses and you will have to pick the limbs off first before you can attack the nape. Just like in the show, gas and blades have to be replenished often and if you are out, it’s game over. There are plenty of supply units on the field so if you plan your movements, you won’t run out of gear.

Outside of combat you will also be taking on secondary objectives during missions. These typically involve you helping a scout out of a sticky situation by helping them clear out certain Titans around them. After you help them they will give you supplies or join your team for the mission. Scouts are ranked from class C to S and most of the main characters are rated B and above. You have a time limit to help your allies, if you fail they will be out for the mission. Even if you get there you have to watch for a Titan grabbing them and trying to eat them, you literally have seconds to save them if they are grabbed. Completing these missions will add to the overall rank of the mission and failing even one will typically get you an A instead of an S for missions. This just means less funds and experience for your characters. Less funds makes it harder to buy weapons and gear and less experience means you won’t get your next skill as quickly. There are various skills for each character that range from increased attack damage or the ability to pick where your allies attack. The skills are based on the stats of the character so higher attack characters get more attack based skill while higher leadership characters will get more control over their allies in combat.

Now there were a couple of issues with the combat in certain areas. You will often times be playing in a city area with Titans roaming in tight corridors between buildings. This isn’t a massive problem when you only have one, you just have to be aware of your surroundings and not crash into the buildings. When multiple Titans are near each other things get a little funky. They start to do these dive attacks later on which break the buildings and put the Titans on the ground, but when another Titan is near they kind of just shoot right back up instead of staying on the ground. This becomes a real issue when you are attempted to strike another Titan and one pops up right in front of you and grabs you. It was more common than I would like, but I guess you could say it was my fault for trying to take on multiple Titans at once. In the open areas this isn’t an issue but you spend a lot of time in Trost for the early part of the game.

The soundtrack seemed to be the same from the series, from what I could remember at least. The game does not have a dub but it has English subtitles. I’m not really sure how to explain the graphics but it kinda of felt like a mix of the Valkyria Chronicles style and DBZ Xenoverse style and it worked out for the game. There are a few things I noticed that could have used some more work, like when they get close up on the jackets but for the most part everything holds up fine. I also didn’t run into any frame issues or game crashes during my whole play through.

If you are a fan of the Attack On Titan series then this should be a no-brainer, get it and enjoy it. If you don’t know the series but enjoy fast paced high intensity action, pick it up and have a good time. Attack On Titan impressed me multiple times and is just plain fun.